Chapter 13

Loving the Lord Thy God with All Thy Broken Heart

Psalms 51:17 The sacrifices of the Lord are a broken spirit: a broken and contrite heart

In the past, I dreaded this scripture.  I had heard interpretations from church leaders that indicate that one obtains a broken heart through adversity, through suffering, through major tragedy such as losing a close loved one or a child or through serious illness or injury.  The gospel of adversity and suffering was not “good news” to me.  It reminded me of the stories I heard as a child of how a bite from a rabid dog should be avoided at all costs, or one would have to submit to the horrific rabies shots in the stomach.  A broken heart caused by suffering, like rabies shots, should be avoided at all costs. But, we are told that the suffering and heart ache was necessary for a “broken and a contrite heart”.

The word for garbage disposal in Spanish is, triturador from the verb “triturar”.  Contrite comes from the same root and means “with grinding action”.  This adds to the ugly imagery of being ground down and broken.   After all, who wants the horrible fate of being dropped into a garbage disposal?

But, the Savior’s message was of abundance, of hope, of being of good cheer, of being healed, of being comforted, of having peace and of having light burdens.  His gospel did not mean rabies shots or being ground up in a garbage disposal.  The horrific things we hear about on the news, the atrocities and suffering in the world, was not his message.  They were not and are not necessary for having a broken heart and contrite spirit.  Let’s see how this works.

Referring back to the parable of the Sower, we see the Savior freely sowing His seed, His word, to all people and in all places. 

20 But he that received the seed into stony places, the same is he that heareth the word, and with joy receiveth it;

21 Yet hath he not root in himself, but dureth for a while: for when tribulation or persecution ariseth because of the word, by and by he is offended.

Then the Lord contrasts the stony places with “good ground”. 

23 But he that received seed into the good ground is he that heareth the word, and understandeth it; which also beareth fruit, and bringeth forth, some an hundredfold, some sixty, some thirty.

What is good ground?  All good gardeners prepare the soil by breaking it up, by softening it and by making it an ideal habitat for the seed to be sowed.  It cannot be stony or hard or it will be impossible or difficult to take root, grow and thrive. 

Loving the Lord Our God with all of our “broken” heart is essential to keeping the first and great commandment.  Otherwise, the unbroken heart will not receive the word (the first commandment) and therefore cannot live it. 

What about the garbage disposal?  “I already feel ground up and ground down by life, how does that help me live the first commandment?”  I believe that the Lord uses the word grind in the sense that we would grind off useless habits, false traditions, vain pride and any other programming or devise that holds us back from the truth.  A contrite heart not only is broken up, it is polished like a river rock through the everlasting waters of Christ that floweth forever and never cease.

John 4:10 Jesus answered and said unto her, If thou knewest the gift of God, and who it is that saith to thee, Give me to drink; thou wouldest have asked of him, and he would have given thee living water.

11. But whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst; but the water that I shall give him shall be in him a well of water springing up into everlasting life.

Rev 22:1 And he shewed me a pure river of water of life, clear as crystal, proceeding out of the throne of God and of the Lamb.

One cannot think of the imagery of a broken heart (fertile, receptive soil) and a contrite spirit (polished and free of pride) without thinking of humility.  In effect, when we have a broken heart and a contrite spirit, we are humble.

Humble comes from the word the latin word “humilis” literally meaning “on the ground” and is related to the word “humus” meaning soil or earth.  To “exhume” something is to remove it from the earth, such as exhuming a body from a grave.  How fitting!  Humus, rich soil for planting seeds, is related to humble.

Christ led the way by being humble.  It has always impressed me that, the King of Kings, Master of Masters, the Son of God, chose to be born in a manger and close to the “humus” and animals, dung and unwashed shepherds with calloused hands in a very lowly setting.  Yes, he chose it.  It was a choice.  When Satan tried to tempt Him and challenged Him to fall from a tower knowing full well that legions of angels would come to His rescue, Jesus humbly refused and chose not to.  Jesus later humbly chose to drink of the bitter cup to suffer and die for us…so we wouldn’t have to!